Close Quarters
by KatsuTami
Summary: When Alyson Stegler is ordered to investigate Max, she isn't sure what to expect. She definitely didn't expect to end up working with the Losers, nor did she think she would develop such complicated feelings... Comicverse, mostly. Jensen/OC.
1. Beginning To End

Chapter One: Beginning to End

**Antigua, West Indies**

**March, 2005**

His eyes said it all. He smiled his usually cocky smile, and he made some stupid, sarcastic comment like he usually did, but his eyes spoke volumes to her. The hurt within his dark blue eyes burned through her and filled her with shame. She wanted to take back what she had just said- _everything_ she had _ever_ said, as a matter of fact. Why could she never say the right thing? If she had only said the right thing this time, then maybe he would know how happy she was to see him, and how overjoyed that she was to even know that he was alive.

Or maybe if she had started off saying the right thing, nearly two years ago now, then he would have understood from the beginning. But saying the right thing from the beginning had been impossible, because back then she had been unable to examine her feelings properly. It wasn't until the damage had already been done that she had realized that she loved him. The realization had come too late; by then, she had already been in too deep, too invested in the mission to consider him and to consider how she might be hurting him.

She had been too selfish, and now she feared that it might be too late.

* * *

**Langley, Virginia**

**July, 2003**

Alyson Stegler sighed at the mound of files she had just pulled out of her work bag. She almost allowed herself to regret taking the task that had been presented to her, but she had been trying to get field work again for months, and she had been taught not to look a gift horse in the mouth. It still felt an awful lot like desk work to her.

Deputy Director Robert Sanderson had cornered her, intrigued her with a C.I.A. mystery, and then left her with a distasteful pile of papers. Instead of immediately delving into the case that had so piqued her interest only a few short hours ago, she procrastinated by cleaning up her office. She reasoned to herself that it was because she couldn't work in clutter, but when she finished and moved on to the kitchen she had run out of excuses and instead just admitted that she truly did not want to read the files.

It was nearly ten o'clock before she opened the first one. She found herself staring at a group photo; six men in military garb, standing in the desert with their arms casually thrown on each others' shoulders stared back at her. She looked again at the tab of the file- it was labelled "Operation Draw Venom". She closed the file and set it aside carefully, not wanting to dive in and get too confused.

The next file was labelled Clay, Lt. Col. Franklin. She opened it and was greeted with another photo, but this one was much more sombre. It was a proper military photo, and the man who looked back at her was a very stern-looking person. He had black hair and a sharp, rugged face, and his eyes seemed to glare at her from under his dark brows. She frowned slightly. Her first opinion was that he was not somebody that she would want to get to know on a close and personal level.

Her second opinion was that he looked like a man with conviction. He looked like he had beliefs and that he stuck to them and stood up for them. He didn't look like the kind of man that would painstakingly work his way up through the military ladder only to turn around and supposedly make a deal with the devil to steal a quarter of a billion dollars from the C.I.A.

Her third impression was that he looked smart. Smart enough to pull such a scheme off, perhaps. She sighed and put his photo down and turned her attention to the rest of his file. There were documentations of operations, but most of the information was blacked out. She might see a few dates and locations, but nothing that on its own would seem important to her. If she couldn't come up with anywhere to start, then she would have to start cross-referencing the information contained in each file in order to find something that they all had in common.

The second file was for a Roque, Cpt. William. She almost took back everything critical she had thought about Franklin Clay. This man had a long scar running vertically on the right side of his face, and a set to his jaw that made her wrinkle her nose. He looked like he had just smelled something bad or seen something distasteful. His dark hair was still cut short in the standard military cut, and his dark eyes were foreboding to her. Not reassuring was his training history. An expert in hand-to-hand combat and demolitions did not usually mean that the person was compassionate and caring.

The third person's file was better. The photo depicting Jensen, Cpl. Jake was a fairly nice one, as far as standard mug-shot style photos went. He had longer, spiky blond hair and the shape of his mouth had the bare suggestion of a roguish smile. His blue eyes were framed with round, military-issue glasses, and he was clearly much younger than the first two. What little information she could glean from a cursory glance through his file showed that he was a graduate of MIT and quite possibly one of the most brilliant and rebellious minds that the military had ever had.

Porteous, Sgt. Linwood, also known as "Pooch", was the pilot of the team. He had an excellent reputation for being able to pilot any craft, sea, air, or otherwise. He also appeared to have a family, something that seemed very odd for a career military man, but she silently applauded his effort. His eyes were friendly below his shiny head, and if it wasn't for the strict military uniform she would have pegged him as an easygoing, friendly man.

Rounding out the pack was Alvarez, Sgt. Carlos "Cougar". He was a hell of a sniper and many teams had wanted him before he had been assigned to work with the self-named "Losers". Even in his photo he wore the cowboy hat that was his trademark, and his long hair was kept loosely tied back. So far, from the limited amount of information that she had gleaned from the files, they had each at several points in their military careers seemed to have had some kind of trouble dealing with authority.

Then, General Grady Coleman had put them together. For what reason? Was the General the connection between this ragtag team and the mysterious Max? The General had been in charge of the team's last mission, codename Draw Venom. Alyson picked up the file that shared the same name and opened it again. Once more, there was little to go on. Crucial dates, like June of 1998, and places, like Peshawar Air Base in Pakistan, leapt out at her from amongst the black marks on the page, but there was little else.

Whatever the operation had been, something had gone horribly wrong, or perhaps horribly right. The Losers had been presumed dead when the chopper that they were supposed to be on crashed in Khyber Pass. Why hadn't they been on it, she wondered to herself. Had General Coleman sold them out to Max to serve his own agenda or had he merely been blind to whatever had happened? Had the Losers made a deal with Max and then tried to double-cross him like the Deputy Director suspected? Alyson massaged her temples gently. It was too much information to process for one night.

As she packed up the files again, she took one final look at the photo of the six men at the Peshawar Air Base. General Coleman and the five men that made up the Losers looked happy, friendly... Amicable. This picture had been taken perhaps only days before their lives had been completely torn apart. Whether it was by their own doing or solely the fault of some mysterious figure known only as Max was her assignment, and she was to follow any and all leads to find out the source of Max and whatever his or her motives could be.

* * *

**Antigua, West Indies**

**March, 2005**

Alyson stared blankly at her hands, trying to decide if there was something that she could say. Anything that she thought of sounded too contrived, too fake, or simply too late. She could feel Jensen's eyes boring into the top of her head from across the table, but she couldn't bring herself to look up at him.

"You didn't really come back here to ask us to join some C.I.A. goose-chase all over the world, did ya?"

She was so shocked by his question that she immediately looked up at him. She couldn't make herself tell the truth, so she said nothing. His gaze was almost too much. His eyes were hard behind his glasses, and the sarcastic twist of his mouth was like a slap to the face. She wanted to see him smile again, to hear him laugh or talk about something mundane and silly again. She couldn't bear his cold indifference.

"I was actually thinking of early retirement," she finally admitted. "I don't want to help them clean house. I don't want to know everything that Max has done. He's hurt us enough, I think." She made herself stop because she felt dangerously close to babbling.

Jensen continued to stare, and tapped his fingers a couple of times on the table. Then, he seemed to take her answer at face-value, and he visibly relaxed. He gave her a curious half-smile that she had only begun to think about returning when it disappeared. "Will they let you do that?"

"I think so. I think they'll be just as glad to see me go as I'll be to leave." She was almost scared to ask. "What about you? Are you ever coming back?"

He shrugged. "I dunno. Pooch has his family here now, so _he_ has no reason to leave, and I figure it's actually pretty nice here. I've been thinking I might stay." He met her gaze squarely and waited for a reaction.

Alyson's mind screamed, _No, come back with me, please, I need you!_ But, as she had already admitted, she never seemed to say what she really meant, so instead she asked him if the weather was this nice all the time.

* * *

**Lynchburg, Tennessee**

**August 2003**

After a week and a half of trying to discreetly dig up information, Alyson had given up that route in frustration. She could get nowhere without attracting attention, and that was the last thing that the Deputy Director wanted. He already suspected that this Max character had agents within the C.I.A. that also worked for his personal agenda, and didn't want anyone being alerted unless necessary.

She decided that the only thing to do was to go and speak with General Coleman. He had been the last available person to ever work with the Losers and had probably had a fairly good rapport with them. The more that she had tried to study Operation Draw Venom, the more that she thought that the General was innocent of any connection to Max. After the Operation's disastrous results, he had been forcibly retired. Now, after five years of relative peace and quiet he had suddenly begun digging around and asking questions.

Somehow not surprisingly, he had asked about a C.I.A. handler by the name of Max. Would he ask about this Max person if he was in cahoots with him and currently living in peaceful retirement? No, probably not. This was especially suspect since the only ties between the General and Max were the presumed dead Losers that had miraculously turned up alive and well only a couple of short weeks ago. Coincidence? No. Alyson didn't believe in coincidence. There was definitely something going on here, and the more that she saw and heard, the more that she was beginning to suspect that the version of the story that the Losers had told to Sanderson was the correct version.

Sanderson had met Clay and the rest of the Losers in Houston, Texas, when they had broken into the Goliath Oil Terminal and been pinned down by the private security company called Parsec, but not before someone had driven off with a quarter billion U.S. Dollars of C.I.A. cash that was en-route to the Cayman Credit Internationale. The C.I.A. had many tight and complicated connections to Goliath, so at the time there was an extremely large warhead on the premises that was for Operation Sanctify. Alyson herself didn't have any details on the operation, but she did know that the C.I.A. was providing unsanctioned military aid to some country or another that was at war.

The Losers had found this warhead during the stand-off, and had promptly wired it with C4 explosives and threatened to take the whole place out if they weren't sent a helicopter. Deputy Director Sanderson had personally flown to Texas in an attempt to mediate the situation. He had met face to face with Clay and been told a very strange story.

Clay wanted to be taken off of a C.I.A. death list, and claimed that they had been put there by a handler named Max. Apparently during Operation Draw Venom in Afghanistan five years earlier they had been sent on a mission. During this mission, they had seen something that they should not have, and Max had tried to have them killed by shooting down the helicopter that they were supposed to be on. By all appearances it had worked, but now they were after Max and the C.I.A. with a vengeance.

The only problem with this story, according to Sanderson, was that the C.I.A. codename Max was a trick, a lure to coax rogue agents out of secrecy. In a complicated ruse, the Losers had escaped, and now Alyson was left to figure out who was telling the truth, if anyone was.

So now, here she was, trying to find her way through complicated back roads to the house that General Coleman shared with his wife. She was not enjoying the experience. He lived near a lake, and the dampness in the air made the place a haven for all sorts of flies and mosquitoes and other such annoying insects.

When she finally found the house, the lights were all dark except for the one on the front porch. A strange feeling crept up her spine; Alyson had not worked extensively in the field before, but she had excellent instincts, and she trusted them. She proceeded cautiously, flicking her gaze across the house and keeping alert for any unexpected movements. She reached the door and was just about to ring the doorbell when she realized that the door actually stood open slightly.

Frowning, she pushed it open gently. She winced when it creaked loudly on its' hinges, but there was no noise from within the house. "General Coleman," she said in a normal voice, but it sounded like a shout in the quiet stillness of the house. "Hello? Anybody home? The door was open..." she let her voice fade away when she realized that nobody was going to answer. Alyson moved further into the house, past a hall table and into the living room.

She almost tripped in the darkness on the still body that lay next to the coffee table. He was face-down and a spilled mug of what was probably coffee stained the carpet next to him. From what she could see of his profile, it was definitely Grady Coleman. "General," she said as loudly as she dared, crouching to get closer. "General?" She was just reaching out to check his pulse when he stirred with a low moan.

"What the hell..." was all he could manage as he struggled into a seated position.

"Don't try to move, sir. It's all right."

"The hell it is!" he exclaimed. "Where's the fucker that slugged me?"

Alyson's mind raced and quickly came up with what she felt was the right answer. "Well, sir, you've been asking some pretty awkward questions around Washington. I'd probably say that somebody would like you to _stop_."

"No shit," he said without a trace of surprise. "In my own god-damned house, too. So why didn't they just kill me?"

"That's a good question," Alyson said, standing slowly and trying to take stock of her surroundings. "Does this house have a gas main?"

"Kitchen," he replied shortly, rubbing his temples. "Why?"

Alyson drew her gun slowly. "Because they'd want to make it look like an accident." Her training kicked in immediately. "Stay low, don't turn on any lights, and _stay away from the windows_."

Suddenly, the General sat up, his eyes widening in terror. "Oh, god, _Jeannie_!" he cried, and then he was up like a shot and running out of the room.

"Sir, get down-!" As soon as she spoke, she heard glass shattering and the quiet, dull thump of bullets hitting flesh. The General went down without a sound. The house was eerily quiet again, except for the sound of Alyson's frightened breathing. _Snipers,_ was the only coherent thought she could manage. She dropped to a crouch and made her way past the prone body of General Coleman. Through the door was the kitchen, where she found another body, presumably that of Jeannie, the General's wife.

She stared for a minute, torn between pity and horror, before she forced her gaze away. She couldn't allow herself to get caught up with the victims right now; now she had to worry about self-preservation. She located the gas main quickly; the smell was permeating the air faster than she liked. She clamped a piece of sweater over her mouth and nose as she approached it, but quickly saw that the pipe had been snapped clean off and there would be no hope of stemming the flow of natural gas into the house. "Son of a bitch. But what's the _trigger_?" she thought aloud.

Then, the tinkle of breaking glass followed a millisecond later by the low hissing noise that that accompanied bullets flying past her head. _At least now I know what the trigger is_, she thought wryly even as she launched herself towards the back door.

Her legs pumped so fast that she felt like she was flying. Then, a moment later, she _was_ flying when a bullet found the open gas main. The gases ignited and expanded so quickly that she was thrown forward, which meant that- as she was running down the dock at this point- that she landed face-first in the lake.

* * *

**Antigua, West Indies**

**March, 2005**

"Wanna beer?" he asked, wiggling his own bottle in her general direction.

She nodded, and he ordered her one with a wave of his hand towards the bartender. She chewed her lip anxiously, not sure how long she could carry on this façade of easygoing friendship. All that she wanted to do was talk about their past, to apologize for everything that she had inadvertently put him through. However, she could not justify bringing up the horrific events that had transpired with her own peace of mind.

Her beer arrived, cold and already sweating in the heat of the Caribbean. She picked at the label, preferring not to look at him while she worked through her indecision. If only she knew exactly what he was thinking. Maybe he was hurting just as badly as she was. Or perhaps he had moved on completely, and didn't really care about their past. Or was he somewhere in the middle? Was he over her, but still wanted explanations, or could it be the other way around?

"So how did ya ever get away from the Sheik?" Jensen asked her, breaking the silence. "I mean, ya held a gun to the guy's head and from what I've heard pretty much nobody gets away with that. I figgered you fer a pine box for sure after that stunt."

Alyson couldn't help but smile. "Well the Agency Nuke Retrieval Team has a certain way of... Negotiating. It pretty much makes argument impossible. They extracted me, and I can tell you right now that I won't be going back to Qatar any time soon."

"Well I'm glad ya made it," he said, smiling at her across the table. This time, she remembered to smile back.

* * *

**San Francisco, California**

**August, 2003**

Alyson had hid out in Lynchburg for a few days, trying to piece together who had been responsible for killing the General and his wife. The C.I.A. had nothing, the State Department had nothing, and so Alyson had nothing.

Fortunately, in her conversations with the C.I.A., another piece if information was given to her. It could be nothing, but it could also be a lead. She had followed it to San Francisco, where a young man by the name of Hashimoto had died in a car accident that Alyson was sure had not been an accident at all.

Now, she was inside of the man's apartment, looking for anything that could possibly tip her off to why he had been killed. She was going through his desk when her phone rang shrilly in the silence, making her jump a little. "Stegler," she said by way of greeting as she flipped the phone open.

She was not prepared for the verbal assault. "What the _hell_ happened in Tennessee?" It was Sanderson. "I've got a _dead General_, the state Governor is crying for blood, and then there's you, disappearing to who knows where! And now you're cooling your heels in California? What the fuck is going on, Stegler?"

Alyson waited a moment, making sure that the Deputy Director was actually finished screaming before she tried to explain. "I'm pretty sure that Max was tying up loose ends in Tennessee, sir. The General was asking a lot of questions all of a sudden, and Max may have been alerted. I barely got out of there myself. I don't know if these Losers are telling the truth about Max trying to off them, but it sure looks like his M.O."

"Okay," Sanderson sighed into her ear, clearly trying to accept what she was saying. "So what's in San Francisco?"

"Well this guy named Hashimoto washes up in a net a couple of days ago. It looks like he tried to go for a swim and forgot to get out of the car first. The police are investigating, they think it's a road rage incident. They pulled a .45 slug out of the headrest, but I think otherwise. A witness did see a white van driving away from the so-called 'accident', and the police ran the plates but got nothing. This is where my lead came in; the plates flagged Langley. Sir, the van was ours."

"I trust that you understand the need for discretion, now," Sanderson said, his voice getting very quiet.

"I do. The van was signed out by Fennel, sir."

Sanderson sighed. "Of course it was. Fennel is dead, did you know that?"

"Yes, sir."

"He was killed during the incident at the Goliath Oil Terminal. At first I thought that he was merely a casualty, but it turns out that he was being investigated internally. I think that he may have been a mole for Max, and either the Losers or someone else took him out. It would explain the connection to Hashimoto."

"That was exactly my reasoning, sir." she said, allowing herself to feel proud that she had found a viable lead on her own.

"All right, Stegler. I'll try to trust you. Keep me updated on what you find."

"Yes, sir," she said, and closed her phone again. She returned her attention to the room, trying to talk herself through what she already knew about Hashimoto. "He worked at Berkeley. No priors, no reports on him... He's a geologist..." She turned to a map that hung on his wall. "Travelled a lot... Shit, he could be connected to Max in a million different ways." She chewed her lip and allowed herself to relax. Maybe if she stopped thinking so hard, something would jump out at her.

A glimmer on the floor caught her eye, and she leaned forward, picking up what turned out to be a push pin lying on the floor directly under the map. It took her a few minutes of close examination, but she soon found a tiny pinhole, the only one in the entire map. She put the pin back in. "Well now," she said to herself with a smile. "What were you doing there, Hashimoto?"

* * *

**A/N: **Thank you for reading the revamped version of Close Quarters! It's a little different, but still the same storyline. The reason for this is that my computer got a virus and I was unable to save anything, including the three chapters I had written but not posted yet... I took the opportunity to start over because I felt like I saw many areas for improvement. At any rate, if you are revisiting, please leave a review so that I know if you like the new version! If you are a first-time reader, please leave a review so that I know that I should keep going! It's very appreciated.


	2. New Missions

**A/N:** so to everyone who had previously subscribed to this story and perhaps haven't seen chapter one yet, I just wanted to let you know that this is REVAMPED and you should seriously go back and read chapter one again! It is the same general storyline, but I have made major changes to format and style, et cetera! Also, just a warning the language in this chapter is upped a little! Anyway thank you for continuing to read!

* * *

Chapter Two: New Missions

**Langley, Virginia**

**September 2003**

"This is fucking bullshit," Alyson muttered to herself, slamming her clothes into her duffel bag. "Fuck you, Sanderson, you lying shit." Her hands were shaking so much that she could barely do up the zipper. She caught a glance of the innocent-looking blue folder lying on her front hall table as she violently chucked her bag towards the door and swore again.

She tried to calm herself with deep cleansing breaths, but she was seeing red and it only served to clear her mind and make more room for her to think about Sanderson and how badly she currently wanted to injure him. She had found a lead, a big lead, and she had risked her own neck to get the information that she had needed, and now Sanderson had shut down her investigation. She was being transferred to an operation on the other side of the world, far away where she couldn't cause any trouble. She was being buried, and she was not happy about it.

Someone had leaned on Sanderson, that much she had figured out on her own. She had just arrived back from San Francisco to debrief him when it had happened. She had been trying to get in touch with him for days, and he had never returned her calls. She was following his protocol; calling from random payphones and leaving brief messages detailing only an approximate window of when she would call next. She had done this several times, and he had never picked up or attempted to contact her in any other way. It was just beginning to get frustrating when she had called him the last time.

Alyson was at a gas station across town from her apartment. She had driven there, but parked her car behind the convenience store. "Sanderson?" she had said with an equal mixture of surprise and relief when he answered. "It's Stegler. I think I've got something big. I figured out how Hashimoto connects to Max, but I can't see _why_."

"Talk fast," he said in short, clipped tones, "I'm on my way to a meeting."

"Okay," she said, pulling a face at him through the phone. "So it looks like Hashimoto's latest project involved some seismic research in the Persian Gulf. He was basically living on a decommissioned oil rig. I traced ownership, which believe you me was a task unto itself, and found- get this- that Max bought the oil rig from the Qatari Royal Family for twelve million _hard cash_."

"Mm hmm," Sanderson said non-committally.

"Now here's where I get a little lost," Alyson said, getting more excited. "I can't figure out Max's angle! What could he be looking for down there? It can't be oil, that location ran dry _years_ ago. Maybe he's looking for a ship or something...?" She trailed off, hoping for some input from Sanderson.

Apparently he didn't get the hint. "Absolutely," Sanderson said, very business-like. "I'll keep you apprised."

Alyson furrowed her brow. "Pardon?" He sounded like he wasn't even listening to her. "Sir, if you aren't in a position where you can talk right now..."

"I'm sure you understand," he interrupted.

"Okay, so should we meet up later-" she started to ask, but he cut her off.

"I'll get back to you, I have more important matters to deal with right now," he said, and without another word he hung up on Alyson.

She looked at the dead receiver in her hand and took a deep breath. She shut her eyes for a moment, and when she reopened them she was not any less angry. "You stupid asshole," she hissed at the payphone. She slammed the receiver down onto its' cradle, and punched the plexiglass to her right angrily. "Drag me into this and then can't even give me two minutes of your time?" She was so distracted by her own anger that she didn't see the black car pulling up in the gas station.

A moment later, she did see Sanderson getting out of it and running towards her. She stepped out of the booth and started to say, "Sanderson? What the fuck is going-"

"Shut up and listen to me!" he interrupted, stunning Alyson into silence. "You are in a lot of god-damned trouble, here!" He got right into her face, jabbing a finger at her. "Now I don't know what the fuck you think you've been doing for the last few weeks, but this little _investigation_ of yours ends here and now!"

Alyson blinked at him for a moment, and then quickly recovered herself. "What the _fuck_ are you talking about? _You're _the one-"

"Don't interrupt! You should just count yourself lucky that I don't have you arrested right here!"

"You _fucking psycho!_" she exploded. It was beyond her control. She no longer cared that he was her superior, or that he could fire her as quickly as a snap of his fingers. She wanted to throttle the little prick for all the trouble for no reason- then, a thought hit her like a bolt of lightning. "Okay," she said, taking a deep breath. "Who leaned on you? Was it the D.C.I.? State? Come on, you can tell me."

He held her gaze for a moment, not budging, until he reached into his coat pocket and pulled out a small blue folder, the same one that now sat on her front hall table. He handed it to her, and as he walked back toward his car, he said casually, "Your flight leaves in the morning."

Which brought her here, packing her bags and trying not to take her anger out on her own apartment. She hadn't even looked at the plane tickets yet. Where was she going to end up? Egypt? Iraq? She shuddered to herself. The only language that she was truly proficient in other than English was Arabic, so she could only assume that any place she was transferred to would be an Arabic-speaking country if it wasn't English. "Stop being a god-damned pussy," she said to herself, looking once again at the little blue folder.

She wanted to burn it, and tell Sanderson to fuck himself. But despite being screwed royally, she loved her job. She fully admitted that perhaps she had romanticized the C.I.A. and allowed herself to get too caught up in the danger and excitement of the mission. Despite what movies and television shows had led the general public to believe, the C.I.A. was not all top-secret missions that usually left a swath of very expendable, very dead minions in their wake. The only field experience that Alyson had was shadowing another agent as he went about his missions. Usually this constituted getting him coffee and taking his phone calls. She had learned more in basic training than she had with that useless man, and the opportunity to finally use all of her training and energy had excited her too much.

She had taken risks. She had, despite all of Sanderson's warnings, raised the alarm. Somebody up high knew that she was digging around for Max, and the repercussions had fallen on Sanderson alone. She had gotten off lucky. Everybody else that had messed around with Max had ended up dead. She sighed, and picked up the airline ticket folder.

As she opened it, Alyson started to laugh. "Oh, you tricky bastard," she said with a grin as she read the destination.

* * *

**Antigua, West Indies**

**March, 2005**

"So what do you think?" Jensen asked Pooch.

Pooch took the time to scrutinize the younger man before answering. Jensen was avoiding his gaze, picking at the edge of the label on the beer he was holding and staring at it intently.

"What do I think about what?" Pooch asked casually, even though he knew exactly what Jensen was referring to.

Apparently Jensen thought his question was ludicrous as well. "Her being here, man, what do you think? She just shows up here like that and I don't even know what to do! Why the fuck is she here?"

"You need to chill, man," Pooch said with a grin, taking a swig of his own beer. "You are way too worked up about this. If something is meant to happen, it'll happen."

"Now _that_," Jensen said, pointing at his friend, "is _bullshit_ and we both know it. You chased Jolene for months before she even agreed to go see a movie with you!"

Pooch let his smile get wider. "So you want to take her out to a movie, then?"

"No! Fuck, I dunno... Cut me some slack here."

"All right, all right. You want to know what I think? I think she came here because the C.I.A. sent her here, just like she said. But I also think that she asked for it. She's the reason we're sitting here in the first place, did you factor that into your equation?"

"Of course I did," Jensen scowled. "But are we still alive because she felt guilty, like she had every reason to, or because of- you know. Because of me," he stammered.

"Personally, I think that if she only saved us out of guilt then we never would have seen or heard from her again. Her conscience would have been clear and she could have lived her years happy knowing that in the end she 'fixed' her mistake. Take what you will from that. But seriously, man, just talk to her. I can speculate all you like but the only person who knows the truth is her. And the only way you're gonna find out what that truth is, is if you talk to her."

"Not helpful whatsoever, man," Jensen grumbled.

* * *

**Doha, Qatar**

**September, 2003**

Alyson stepped out of the airport and took a deep breath. Doha was a bustling city, modern and rich and full of people. The airport itself was crowded, but clean and airy. She felt good breathing in the fresh air so close to the coast.

She was pretty sure that the airport could have been stuffed full of sheep and cattle and she would have been happy to be here. She was in Doha, the capitol city of Qatar and home to the Qatari Royal Family, the very people who had sold Max the oil rig that Hashimoto had been living on. If she was going to continue her investigation from anywhere, it would be from here.

She had been delivered a folder once she had boarded her first flight, a small package from the C.I.A. giving her minor details on her new, legitimate assignment. She was to work under the Station Chief for P.2.O.G., a man named simply Grainger according to her folder. What P.2.O.G. was in charge of she wasn't sure, but she hoped that she would still have ample free time to investigate her illegitimate assignment.

Alyson was no longer sure if Sanderson supported her, but everything happened for a reason. Sanderson had known where her investigation had led her, and still he had transferred her to the next logical step even while he told her to discontinue all activity.

She hailed a cab quickly and gave the driver the address that she had been given after he helped her to load her bags. The cab took off at such a speed that Alyson quickly decided that locking her seat belt was an excellent idea. This idea was confirmed when the cab swung around corners so quickly that Alyson's seatbelt locked and cut into her chest. She almost wished that he would drive slower and take his time; after all, Doha was a city to be admired. Skyscrapers the like of which she had never seen in America defined the skyline. An abundance of glass made the city appear to sparkle in the sunlight, and at the street level the bustle and colour of the people humanized the modern setting.

_I'll have time to admire later_, she promised herself. The cab continued to swerve and dodge through traffic in a dangerous manner, but as nobody seemed to pay any attention Alyson could only assume that this was the normal behaviour for cab drivers in Qatar. Overall, the city reminded her of photos that she had seen of various places in India; there were beautiful feats of architecture mixed in with the bright, lush greens of various plant life. She sighed happily. Doha was truly beautiful, and for a moment she forgot about her mission to find Max and simply enjoyed the opportunity to visit this exotic land.

Within twenty minutes the cab was pulling up in front of a building. It was no skyscraper, but it was just as modern and glass-covered as the rest of the buildings in the city. She thanked the cab driver profusely and gave him a large tip, secretly hoping that she would never have to enter another vehicle with him again. She double-checked the address, which was correct, and then hefted her two duffel bags onto her shoulders and entered the building.

The lobby was a lot darker than it was outside and it took her eyes a few moments to adjust. It was also much cooler, and goosebumps rose on her arms. The lobby was decorated in various types and shades of brown marble, and other than a few doors and a small seating area, the only thing in it was a massive reception desk. The name embossed in the marble behind the prim-looking receptionist was irrelevant; the C.I.A. wouldn't advertise their presence here any more than they would in Iraq.

"Do you have an appointment?" the receptionist asked, barely glancing toward Alyson.

She immediately bristled. She didn't like snooty women. "Yes, I do. My appointment is with Howard Grainger."

"Your name?"

"Alyson Stegler." she replied, just as shortly.

"I'm sorry, but we have no-one listed with that name."

Alyson narrowed her eyes at the receptionist. "Well if you wouldn't mind checking _again_, that would be simply _wonderful_. It's Grainger. G-R-" she started to spell it out when a voice from behind her interrupted her.

"I'm sorry, I'm here, I'm here! Stegler, right?"

She turned around to see a shorter man with dark brown skin and an offensive amount of stubble. He wore reflective sunglasses, even in the dim light of the lobby, and she could see that his hairline was already receding. "You must be Grainger," she said, allowing her distaste to be heard in her voice even as she reached out to shake his hand.

"Yeah, that's me! Let's get you outta here, all right?" he said, reaching down and grabbing one of her duffel bags off of the floor. He immediately turned and walked right out of the lobby and back to the street, leaving Alyson with no choice but to hurry after him. "My car's right over here!" he called over his shoulder as Alyson caught up with him.

She managed to wait until her bags were loaded into his trunk and they were on the road before she started grilling him. "So what was that about?" she asked, not wasting any breath on pleasantries. "Did you guys get kicked out of the office that Langley rented or something?"

Grainger laughed, a noise that Alyson immediately decided that she did not like whatsoever. "No, office space is at a premium in Doha. We sublet the office space to a bunch of dot-com start-up companies and we're in an empty warehouse just outside the city. The warehouse is way cheaper and we can jack up the rent on the office in the city. Langley foots the bill and we take a slice of the profit. Everybody wins." He must have felt Alyson's eyes burning holes in the side of his head because he chanced a look at her. "We're just getting our slice of the profits from the War on Terror. What? You look like you want to say something."

Alyson clenched her jaw and looked away. "Nope. I'm good."

* * *

**Antigua, West Indies**

**March, 2005**

"So what the hell am I supposed to say to her, huh?" Jensen asked desperately.

"How about, 'So what have you been up to for the last year?'," Pooch said with a grin.

"I think we've done the awkward small-talk to death."

Pooch shrugged. "True enough, I suppose. You're gonna have to think of something, my man. She told me she's only planning on staying for a week. Something about making it look like she really tried to convince us, you know? I figure if she wasn't waiting for something she'd high-tail it out of here pretty damn quick."

"Yeah, I got it, man. You gotta lot of theories and no ideas. Shit, help me out here! I seriously have no idea what the fuck I'm supposed ta say to her!" The note of imploring desperation in Jensen's voice really got Pooch's attention.

"Okay, okay! The two of you used to do all that computer shit for us right? You know, like when you sorted through Max's accounts? Why don't you ask for her help with something on your computer?"

"I don't need help with shit on my computer," Jensen shot back, sounding exasperated. "_She_ needed _my_ help."

Pooch gritted his teeth, trying not to snap at the hacker. "Pretend. It'll get you relaxed and talking naturally to each other instead of that stiff, formal exchange of random words that you two had earlier by the bar. That was actually painful to watch, by the way. Plus if you guys are working at something you'll have something to look at other than each other. It's always easier to say something if you don't have to look the person in the eye."

"Again, that's all well and good but what am I supposed to be trying to _say_, here?"

"I don't fuckin' know, man! What do you _want_ to say to her?"

Jensen was getting so worked up that he just blurted out the first things that he thought of. "What the fuck was she thinking? And why the _fuck_ did she just leave me like that?"

Pooch was silent for a moment, regarding his friend. "Well there you go, buddy, I guess you know how you really feel about her, huh?" He wasn't sure how optimistic to be, because instead of smiling or having a pensive look of self-realization on his face, Jensen was frowning so hard that it was almost a grimace.

**

* * *

Doha, Qatar**

**September 2003**

"So it really is P.2.O.G. here?" Alyson asked as she looked around the shoddy warehouse. She already missed the nice, classy building in downtown Doha, snooty receptionist and all. "I thought maybe I misunderstood the meaning."

"Nope," Grainger said, kicking back behind his desk and thumping his shoes onto the top. "P.2.O.G., the Proactive Preemptive Operations Group is exactly what it sounds like."

"Stimulating a terrorist response wasn't exactly something I thought would be in my job description," Alyson said harshly. "In fact, I'm pretty sure we're supposed to be _protecting_ America from terrorism."

"Yeah but it does a damned good job of bringing them outta hiding," Grainger said smugly.

Alyson threw up her hands in frustration. "The situation is shaky enough out here as it is! Why the hell would we want to destabilize the situation even further? You push these people hard enough and they will push back! Then what? We have religious extremists in power? And what if we lose _American_ lives when you 'stimulate a terrorist response'?"

"Hey, hey, hey," Grainger said, spreading his hands wide. "I'm just following orders here. You can't make an omelette, you know? Now come on, we got an operation to discuss." Grainger called in a couple of other agents, and after some perfunctory introductions they moved on to the matter at hand. "So Max has sent us a list of some of the extremists hostile to the Qatari regime. The recommended action is a bombing of one of their mosques. What do you think, Stegler?"

"I'm sorry, did you say _Max_?" Alyson asked, her entire body tensing at the name. "Max who?"

Grainger shrugged, glancing at the fax in his hand. "I dunno, some analyst back home I'd assume-"

Alyson snatched the paper out of his hand, ignoring his feeble protest. "This is a _local_ area code!" she growled, shaking the paper under his nose.

"Hey, Stegler, you need to calm down," Grainger said slowly. "I think we need to talk about where your head's at... Hello? Earth to Stegler?"

Alyson didn't respond. She was too busy looking out the window at the building across the way, where she could clearly see some shadowy figures with what appeared to be a very large rocket launcher pointed straight at the window that she was looking through. She didn't even have time to scream a warning when they launched the rocket straight at her.

**

* * *

A/N:** holy language Batman! Anyway, hope you enjoyed this latest installment of the revamped version of Close Quarters! Please leave a review, and a huge thank-you to everyone that also reviewed chapter one! I love to hear that my work is appreciated, it really motivates me to write so please keep it up! Also, mini-poll (if you like you can answer in your review); I'm just wondering how many people have read the comic series that the movie was based on? I'm really curious to know how many people that are reading this have! Anyway thanks again!


	3. Apologies

Chapter Three: Apologies

**Doha, Qatar**

**September 2003**

When Alyson regained consciousness she didn't know how much time had passed. She felt immediately the pounding of her head and heard the ringing in her ears. Her vision took a few moments longer to clear, and even when it did she was completely disoriented.

The room that she had been in no longer existed. It was in shambles. She lay in the approximate area of where a corner of the room had been; the wall was mostly destroyed. It appeared that the rocket had broken through the window and detonated against the opposite wall, completely disfiguring the room.

She inadvertently let out a low moan of pain as she did a quick self-evaluation; there was a large slice down her right forearm that was letting a steady stream of blood drip to the floor. The ringing of her ears was abating slightly, and she began to hear Grainger from across the room.

"A bomb! That was a god-damned bomb!"

Alyson sat up slowly, seeing Grainger standing across the room and looking wildly around at the ruins of his cheap warehouse office. She struggled to her feet, trying to ignore her screaming muscles, but remained in a slightly crouched position. She spotted other agents also recovering themselves; nobody seemed to be seriously injured or killed, but she left the headcount to Grainger.

"Everybody stay down," she managed to say in a voice that seemed both too hoarse and too loud at the same time. "I have a feeling this isn't even close to being over."

Grainger looked at her in disbelief. "Come on, Stegler, surely they're long gone by-" He was cut off by the loud staccato noise that accompanied automatic gunfire. Alyson lunged in one direction and Grainger in the other. She found herself pressed against a wall, looking at Grainger as he cowered behind what remained of his desk.

"What's the matter, haven't you ever been shot at before?" she yelled over the noise.

"N-no!" Grainger stuttered, looking more terrified by the second.

Alyson hadn't either, but she was running on an adrenaline high now. Her training had taken over, her mind working through several scenarios and possible outcomes. "Well shooting back is usually a good place to start! You guys have a weapons locker in this place?"

"D-downstairs in the workshop," Grainger managed, barely audible over the gunfire.

"Show me," Alyson commanded. Grainger crawled toward Alyson and the stairwell that was next to where she huddled. When he finally reached her, pale and shaking, she had to stifle a laugh. Her adrenaline rush was playing with her emotions. She should by all rights be terrified for her life, but instead she wanted to run outside to the building across the street, guns blazing, hero-style. "They seem to have the front covered," she said as they ran down the stairs, "but we'll sneak out a back window! We can each take a side of the building and flank them."

She didn't see the look of pure terror that Grainger was sending towards the back of her head.

* * *

**Antigua, West Indies**

**March 2005**

Alyson felt like crying, but her eyes were dry. She was in her hotel room, looking out of her window, when she saw Jensen and Pooch sitting down on the patio. She was two stories up, but it was the hottest part of the day, and as such there was very little activity outside. She couldn't hear exactly what they were saying, but she could see that Jensen looked agitated. He was animated, throwing his hands around in an exasperated manner as he spoke and often seeming to cut Pooch off mid-sentence.

Pooch, on the other hand, looked calm and collected. He seemed to be attempting to reason with Jensen, but when Jensen was worked up that was nearly impossible. Then, Alyson had managed to hear more than indistinct words and sentences. Jensen raised his voice, and the small bit that Alyson heard was what made her want to cry. "- the _fuck_ is she thinking?"

He was talking about her, she knew it instantly. He was agitated and upset because of her. "I shouldn't have come here," she said to herself as she moved away from the window. She felt exhausted, mentally and emotionally. She hadn't expected this trip to be filled with emotional reunions, but she hadn't thought that it would be so awkward.

Jensen could barely speak to her except to make idle chit-chat, and she was completely unsure of what to say to him. She wanted to apologize to him, but for what? She really had several options, and she weighed them in her mind.

'Jensen, I'm sorry that I came here just to stir up painful memories for a mission that I knew you wouldn't accept anyway,' was her most recent transgression. But apologizing for that would mean that she would have to explain why she had come here if she had known he would say no. Which in turn would mean that she would have to come clean about everything, so she would much rather apologize for something else instead.

'I'm sorry that I didn't find you sooner, Jensen.' That was a pretty good one, because he had been damned hard to track down. In fact, until two months ago Alyson had only been half sure that he was even still alive. The last that anybody had been able to confirm he had been sneaking into Max's stronghold with the rest of the Losers. At least one of them had definitely escaped with Pooch, but Alyson had no clues as to who or how many for sure. Then, Pooch's plane had been shot out of the sky by the Qatari Royal Family. Alyson had made sure that all of the authorities presumed the entire team dead, but she had held hope that the crash-landing had been staged and that the Losers had escaped with their lives.

The only problem with that apology was that she wasn't sure that Jensen even _wanted_ to be found. They had covered their tracks excellently, and her finding them only showed that they _could_ be found. And found by the C.I.A., no less, the last people that they wanted to find them.

Her final option for apology was not something that Alyson wanted to consider. It would have been too hard to put into words, as it would basically amount to an apology for everything that had ever transpired between them. It was a conversation that Alyson wasn't looking forward to having, but one that she knew would most likely happen eventually.

She was stuck again, going around in circles in her own head. She lay down on her bed and shut her eyes, trying to clear her mind, and then she fell asleep.

She didn't know how long she slept, but the room was filled with the orange glow of the sunset when she was woken by a quiet knock at the door. "Come in," she said sleepily, rubbing her eyes.

It was Jensen. Alyson immediately froze, propped up awkwardly on one arm, unable to stop staring at him. She assumed he was staring back, but she was unable to see his eyes behind the glare of the sun off of his glasses.

"Hey," he finally said, "I didn't mean to wake ya. I can go..." He gestured at the door but didn't move.

"No, no," she said hurriedly, sitting up fully and swinging her legs off the side of the bed. "Come in, please." She felt tense and on edge, disoriented from her nap and unsure of what Jensen was here for. She watched him, trying to read his mood, as he pulled up one of the small armchairs that decorated her room and took a seat. He looked stoic, but more relaxed than he had the first time that they spoke after she arrived.

"So," he said quietly after a moment, "I feel like we should talk. Like, have a serious conversation. No meaningless chit-chat about the weather."

"Okay," she said, unsure of how to react. "What did you want to talk about?"

He looked out the window and didn't say anything for a while. Alyson took the time to examine his face, as she hadn't _really_ looked at him since she had arrived. He looked older than when she had seen him last, over a year ago in the Ukraine. He had a tan, and a couple more lines on his face, but he looked good. His blue eyes were just as electrified as they had always been, and it made her feel better that he seemed healthy and together.

"Do ya know about the first time that I heard of you?" Jensen suddenly asked, meeting her gaze directly.

"No," she said quietly, wondering where he was going with this.

"It was in Qatar. The first time ya saw Clay. The Sheik needed us to keep the extremists from killing any Americans, because it was the only way to keep his country peaceful. We went there, barely in time to save anybody. That idiot, Grainger or whatever his name was, told us that you charged into a building filled with extremists, _by yourself_. I was pretty impressed, ya know, even though you are a _girl_," he teased gently. "Clay told us afterwards that you'd been shot in the leg and were holding off about twenty extremists with nothin' left but a pistol."

"It was pretty stupid," she agreed with a smile. "I'd never even been in combat before. I was on an adrenaline rush. I don't think that Grainger could have stopped me if he tried."

"Damn, girl, see what I mean? Seriously, who does that shit? Other than crazy chicks I mean. _Then_, Clay saves your ass and you point a gun at _his_ face."

"I let him go," she said defensively. "I shouldn't have, but I did. I just knew that something about the whole situation wasn't right. I knew that the Losers weren't the bad guys."

"We weren't exactly the good guys, either," Jensen said with a grin. "But anyway, my point is that you impressed me, even before I met ya. And I guess I'm tryin' to say that you're still pretty impressive... And a little intimidating." Alyson smiled as she saw a slight hint of a blush rise on Jensen's face.

Perhaps there was hope, after all.

* * *

**Doha, Qatar**

**September 2003**

Alyson felt like an idiot. She was in the hospital with a bullet wound in her leg. The bullet itself was not interfering with anything, so the doctors had opted to leave it in, and forced her to stay in bed until the healing was under way.

The bullet, however, was not the reason for her self-hatred. She was angry at herself for being so stupid as to charge into a building filled with extremists out for American blood before even making sure that the coward Grainger was following her. He had not, and she had ended up face-to-face with about thirty or so extremists who had instantly opened fire on her. She had managed to get herself cornered in a room with a bullet wound in her leg and no ammunition left for her semi-automatic.

They were coming for her, and she knew that all she had left was her pistol. Then, an explosion, some screams, and finally a single gunshot. The footsteps approaching her were heavy and unafraid.

She tensed, her hand still on her pistol, waiting to see who it was.

It was an American, tall with black hair and wearing, strangely enough, a suit without a tie. He looked so oddly out of place that Alyson forgot to be defensive or to raise her weapon. The man had immediately knelt and given her leg a cursory examination. "It missed the femoral, you'll live," he said gruffly, ripping a piece of fabric from her pants and directing her to keep pressure on the wound.

"Who the hell are you?" Alyson burst out, finally finding her voice.

"I was gonna say 'a friend', but I'm no friend of the C.I.A.," he said viciously.

She took in his dark hair and the steely glint in his eyes, and suddenly she knew who he was. "Wait a second, you're-" He looked at her abruptly and she cut herself off. "That is, you're a life-saver," she finished lamely.

The man stood and turned away, lighting a cigarette. "Just stay put. Somebody will get you."

As soon as he was distracted by the flame on his lighter, Alyson tightened her grip on her pistol and aimed it directly at the back of his head. "Don't move, Clay. Hands where I can see them."

He turned slightly so that he could see her from his peripherals, cigarette hanging from his lips. "You've got me confused with somebody else. You've lost a lot of blood, you're not thinking straight-"

"I can still _shoot_ straight," she said, narrowing his eyes. "I know all about the Goliath heist. Where's the money, Clay? Where's _Max_?"

"Max works for you people!" Clay exclaimed, pointing accusingly at Alyson. "You ever track him down, I'll give you ten bucks for his _head_. Now, if you're planning on shooting me, I suggest you stop wasting my god-damned time and pull the trigger."

Alyson began to feel like she was losing control of the situation. "I'm not fucking around here!"

"Neither are we," he said in a level voice. They stared each other down for a moment before he turned and began to walk away slowly, smoking his cigarette. Alyson kept her aim on him until he was out of sight, and then sighed and lowered her pistol.

Not long after, she had been picked up by more C.I.A. agents and taken directly to the hospital.

And now here she was, only a couple of days later, picking through the encounter over and over again and wondering what Clay had meant. Max wasn't C.I.A., he couldn't be, or Sanderson would have known. She thought to herself, not for the first time, that for the Deputy Director of the C.I.A., Sanderson seemed to be extremely out of the loop on this one.

A soft knock at the door interrupted her train of thought, and Alyson looked up to see the soft-spoken nurse who had been her primary caretaker for the last couple of days.

"Hello, Alyson," she said with a smile, "I am here to check on you."

"Hello, Nurse Shreya," Alyson replied with her own smile. She liked the older woman a lot, enough to look forward to the few minutes every day when Shreya would stop by to talk to her.

"You have a phone call," she said quietly, all business. "Just pick up the receiver, it has already been transferred to your line." She smiled again and bowed slightly, backing out of the room as quickly as she had appeared.

Alyson grabbed up the receiver eagerly, hoping for news from home. She was not disappointed as an automated voice rhymed off a short series of numbers that she memorized. It was an access code for her to check in with Sanderson; used with the emergency number he had given her at the beginning of their illegal mission, she could have a secure conversation with him. She would not, however, call from the hospital. She would be allowed to walk for a short time tomorrow, and she already knew that her first mission would be to find a payphone.

* * *

**Antigua, West Indies**

**March 2005**

"So why are we talking about my suicidal attempt to fight off a gang of extremists?" Alyson asked.

Jensen shrugged. "Because it's kinda funny."

"Jensen, you said you wanted to have a serious talk," Alyson pointed out gently.

"Yeah..." he said distractedly, leaning back in his chair with a sigh and running his hand through his spiky hair.

She waited, not wanting to push him but wanting nothing more than to know why he was suddenly here, in her hotel room, looking so adorably out of place. She realized, suddenly, that her room was a mess and felt extremely embarrassed. She had not really unpacked since her arrival the night before, and due to the very hot weather had gone through her clothes at an alarming rate. Her suitcase still occupied the spot on the floor where she had thrown it upon her arrival. It was wide open and showing off the general disarray that she usually packed in, with nothing folded and most of it now tossed around during her efforts to find changes of clothes. There was also laundry strewn about the floor, and she tried to surreptitiously kick a pair of underwear under her bed.

The movement caught Jensen's eye and he looked at her, grinning. "So you're still pretty much a walking disaster, huh?"

"Yeah," she said, trying not to look as embarrassed as she felt.

"Hey, I'm not judging! There had to be _some_ deep dark thing that was wrong with ya. I mean jeez, you're beautiful, a C.I.A. agent, you're pretty damn sexy, you're more bad-ass than most guys I've seen in the Army, you look really good in shorts, you're smart..." She raised her eyebrow at him. "I guess what I'm trying to say is that I really admire your legs. I mean brain!" he said quickly, making it clear with his smile that it wasn't what he meant at all.

Alyson smiled back, relishing the feeling of reconnecting with Jensen in the way that she had when they'd first met. She hadn't felt so at ease around him since she'd arrived. It had only been twenty-four hours ago, but it had been a long twenty-four hours, filled with tension and angst. This was nice, this easy-going, joking atmosphere.

She wondered how long it could possibly last.

"Hey," Jensen said with a huge grin, "do you remember the _second_ time you pointed a gun at Clay's face?"

* * *

**London, England**

**October 2003**

Alyson felt energized sitting in St. James Park. For over a month she had been in Doha, first confined in the hospital due to her injuries and then participating in the investigation of the incident at P.2.O.G. Headquarters. Her communications with Sanderson had been extremely limited and convoluted. She had not spoken directly with the Deputy Director since her transfer to Doha; instead they had been communicating through coded messages and automated phone calls.

Sanderson had directed her to drop under the radar again once the investigation was over. She had been flown to London almost immediately, and now she was waiting for a dead drop. It was a complicated procedure that involved her basically following a string of clues from spot to spot. The clues would eventually lead her to a packet of information, confidential and highly classified.

Alyson had no idea what exactly this information would pertain to, but she could only assume that unless her trail was to be even more convoluted than it already had been that her business would be here, in London.

For now, however, she was trying to enjoy the wonderfully beautiful weather in the park. There weren't a lot of people walking around, but Alyson enjoyed the peace and quiet. She waited for the last person to leave the small white building located only a couple hundred yards away. She had been keeping track for a half hour now, and by her count there was nobody in the women's side of the bathroom.

She stood quickly, not wasting any time, and walked at a casual but brisk pace. The last stall on the left held the clue that she was looking for- the words 'call for a good time' were scrawled in black marker above a seven-digit number that Alyson quickly memorized before washing her hands and exiting the bathroom.

She went for a leisurely stroll around the park for a while before walking back to Broadway St. She considered catching a cab, but it was such a nice day that she decided to walk to Victoria Station, her next stop. It was a short walk, less than fifteen minutes, but the streets were fairly crowded and it didn't get much better when she was off the street.

Victoria Station was crowded, and Alyson was beginning to feel slightly paranoid. She tried to appear casual as she studied every person with a hat or a high coat collar or a newspaper or magazine in front of their face. They all appeared to be normal people going about their days, but then again Alyson was pretty sure that was what she looked like to them.

After one last look around to settle her misgivings, she headed for the Left Luggage counter, but once in the corridor made a quick left. There was a security guard in a small booth, but he was engrossed in a book and Alyson slipped past him easily into the locker rental area. The number that she had seen written in the bathroom stall was zero-three-four-seven-two-six-one. The first three numbers Alyson had already figured out based on her previous clues; they referred to a locker number located here at Victoria Station.

The last four numbers she assumed referred to the combination to said locker, and upon finding locker number thirty-four, she discovered that this was correct. The locker was close to the floor, so she knelt on one knee to see inside. All that she could see was a brown legal-sized envelope, so she grabbed it quickly and shoved it inside her coat. At the same time, she pulled out her cellphone in order to confirm that she had made the pick-up.

As she flipped open the small silver phone, she saw a reflection in the screen. Standing behind her was a tall person, probably a man, with a pistol held only inches behind her head.

* * *

**A/N:** Thank you for sticking it out! I know it took a while, I've honestly been a bad, bad author and procrastinated a lot... But I promise that more will be forthcoming and quite soon, especially if I keep receiving all of those wonderful reviews! Even if it's just a couple of words, every review means the world to me and gives me renewed inspiration to write! Thank you in advance!


	4. Meetings

Chapter Four: Meetings

**London, England**

**October 2003**

It was over in the time that it would have taken Alyson to blink. She had spun around on one of her knees and simultaneously shot her arm up, leading with the heel of her palm. She connected with a satisfying crack that sent the man reeling backwards, dropping the gun. Alyson had fallen forward, grabbing the man's gun, even as he pulled a second reserve piece from under his pant leg. "Do you really think I wouldn't have a second-"

He was cut off as Alyson fired, silencing him forever. "Jesus," she sighed shakily to herself as she stood to retrieve her cellphone, trying to avoid looking at the man she had just killed. She ensured that the envelope was still securely tucked into her coat before high-tailing it out of a back door just as the police arrived at the front.

She caught a taxi this time, wanting nothing more than to get back to her room at the Primrose Hilton. She completed the phone call that she had been about to make earlier, punching in the code for the encrypted voice mail. "Sanderson, it's Stegler," she said quickly. "I have the package, but the drop was compromised. You need to be careful, sir. I think he's on to you..."

Flipping the phone shut, she exhaled deeply and rested her head on the seat back for a moment. She wouldn't open the file until she was back in her room, but she was very interested to find out what information she had almost been killed for.

* * *

**Antigua, West Indies**

**March 2005**

"So, do you?" Jensen asked.

Alyson laughed. "I remember it quite well, but I'm pretty sure Clay hated me after that."

"Yeah," Jensen said sarcastically. "The fact that you kept popping up and ruining his plans and that you were from the C.I.A. had _nothing_ to do with the fact that he didn't really like you. It was all the times that you pointed guns in his face, because a Lieutenant Colonel in the U.S. Army who was a veteran of many Black Ops missions just couldn't handle a gun in the face now and then."

"You think you're _so_ _funny_," she teased gently.

"You know, he never would tell us the full story and I never got around to asking you before. Care to share? I feel like this story is something I've been wanting to hear," he finished with a grin.

"Well," she began, "after the incident in Doha, I was sent to London and found myself with a package in my possession that contained some very crucial information. It took a couple weeks to formulate my plan, and then I realized that I was quite possibly going to come face-to-face with Franklin Clay yet again..."

* * *

**London, England**

**November 2003**

Alyson was slightly nervous. She was sitting in a secluded office at the Cayman Credit Internationale, waiting. It was a huge bank, and this was its' headquarters. The building itself was quite modern and beautiful, but Alyson had little time to admire the architecture.

Then, she heard a scuffle in the next room. She stood, pulling out her pistol and moving toward the door. The noises stopped abruptly, and she heard two voices, one male and one female, exchange a few words. There was no time like the present. Taking a deep breath, she opened the door and immediately levelled her gun at the man and woman standing in the centre of the room. She took in the two security guards on the floor, both bleeding from minor wounds, and the cowering assistant who had brought the two 'guests' into the office.

"Thank you, Miss Feathrington," she said to the assistant, "That will be all." The guards and Miss Feathrington stood, making their exits quickly. Alyson felt bad that they had been injured, but they had known the possibilities when she had briefed them. "Sorry about the welcoming committee there," she directed at the man and woman in front of her. "I'd much rather have done this in a more relaxed setting, maybe over a beer, but I guess you know how it is." She directed the rest of her speech to the man. "I never got the chance to properly introduce myself in Qatar."

The man's dark brow furrowed over his glaring eyes. Lieutenant Colonel Franklin Clay was an imposing man. "The way I remember it, I saved your ass and then you pulled a gun on me," he said bluntly. "I figure that's all the introduction I need."

"You know," Alyson said hotly, "The sooner you drop all this stoic tough-guy _bullshit_, the sooner you'll realize that we're on the same side here! I'm Alyson Stegler, C.I.A."

"Imagine my fuckin' surprise," Clay said dryly.

Alyson leaned back against the desk, keeping her gun in hand and one eye trained on Clay's dark female companion. "Listen, I really don't want to go a whole ten rounds with you on this one. Now since I'm the one with the gun here, I guess I don't really have to. I'm just gonna lay it out, and you listen." Clay said nothing, so Alyson continued. "A few months ago, Deputy Director Sanderson assigned me to track down somebody that I believe is of your acquaintance, Max. Officially, Sanderson was warned off and told to shut it down. _Un_officially, he continued to supply me with everything that I needed, including a file connecting Max to the Cayman Credit Internationale."

"Max is one of yours," Clay's companion broke in, surprising Alyson. "If you want him, take him." She had a very slight middle-eastern accent.

"Unfortunately, it isn't that simple," Alyson said, working up to the reason that she had decided to confront Clay like this. "Three days ago, what's left of Sanderson's body was dragged up by a Norwegian trawler out of the Barents Sea. I can't trust the regular channels any more. I need backup."

"So you came to us?" the woman asked. "Why would we _ever_ trust _you_?"

Alyson turned her attention back to Clay. "Because I trust _you_. It's like you said- you saved my ass once. Now Max has us all in his sights, and if we don't work together on this we can't take him down." She tried to be patient, but Clay's silence and level stare was unnerving.

Finally, he said, "If you think I'm negotiating with a gun to my face, then you got another thing coming. Neutral ground. My terms. Dawn"

Alyson barely hesitated before stowing away her gun. "Deal."

The next day, Alyson was on her way to meet Clay at the Millennium Bridge. The bridge itself was a work of beautiful simplicity, a modern footbridge that somehow managed to fit in with the architecture along the River Thames. She could see two lone figures ahead of her, waiting in the middle of the bridge. She could only assume that it was Clay and one of his men, or perhaps the woman again.

The night before, Alyson had done a bit of research on the outspoken woman that had accompanied Clay to the bank. Her name was Aisha al-Fadhil, but not much information was forthcoming. She had grown up all over the Middle-East, from what Alyson could find. Her past was sketchy at best, and her present was alarmingly shady. Alyson fully intended to investigate the woman further at the earliest opportunity. She didn't like being involved with people with such unclear motives.

As she got closer, Alyson confirmed that Clay was indeed there, and that he was with another man that had a backpack on his shoulders and a baseball cap pulled low over his face. As she got closer, she could see that the second man had a very distinct goatee; remembering the Losers' files, she instantly identified him as Jake Jensen, the young hacker.

Both men said nothing and simply watched her approach, most likely studying her just as closely as she was studying them. "Nice view," she said by way of greeting when she was close enough.

"We're exactly three hundred and thirty seven yards from the top of the Gallery tower on the south bank," Clay said shortly in response. "From this distance, Cougar can shoot off a gnat's pecker with both eyes closed and one hand behind his back."

"Nice to see you too," Alyson said snidely, trying to keep herself from an outright sneer.

"Look down," Clay said, appearing to ignore her comment.

She did, and saw the small red dot of a laser sight trained steadily on her midsection. "Point taken," she said, in a voice that sounded less brave than she had wanted.

"Just so that we understand each other," Clay said in a tone that was far from reassuring. "Jensen?" He motioned to his companion, who stepped forward holding a device in his hand that only slightly resembled a metal-detector rod.

"I just gotta scan you," he said, meeting Alyson's eyes.

She nodded, holding her arms up slightly. "Go for it." Jensen's face was much more trustworthy than Clay's; it gave Alyson a boost of confidence that the opinions that she had formed from their pictures so far seemed to hold true.

The not-quite-a-metal-detector seemed to be attached by an electrical cord to Jensen's backpack. He flipped a switch on the rod and a blinking green light came on. He waved it slowly over and around her, stopping a couple of times and helping her to empty her pockets.

"We got some change, car keys, coat zipper... That's it," he said, switching off the device and stowing it in his backpack quickly. "No hidden weapons, no outgoin' R.F., no passive recorders... She's lookin' good," he finished with a roguish wink at Alyson. Despite the precarious situation, Alyson found herself smiling easily at him. Clay was clearly ready to get down to business, so Jensen made himself scarce. As he walked away, Alyson wished that he would stay. She already missed the easygoing atmosphere that he created, and she had only interacted with him for less than a minute. Instead, she was stuck talking alone with Clay, a man who seemed to try his hardest to be abrasive and abrupt in every way possible.

"The first thing I want to know is how you knew we would be at C.C.I.," Clay said. His voice didn't have the tone of a demand, only the tone of a man who knew that his every statement would be obeyed.

Alyson did her best to quell her negative feelings toward the Colonel. "The bank was _created_ by the C.I.A., it wasn't exactly difficult for me to get in there undercover. Then, your application flagged up when you claimed to be a supplier for Operation Sanctify. I knew that it sounded familiar, and then I remembered; the warhead in Texas."

"Got our foot in the door," said Clay in a petulant tone that grated Alyson's nerves.

"Yeah, sure, and if I hadn't showed up it might have even led you guys to Max. In like, a _decade_ or so," Alyson said, not holding back her sarcasm. "Fortunately for _you_, I happen to have a much better way."

"Ten-to-one says it involves putting my team in the line of fire, right?" Clay said sardonically.

Alyson didn't feel like making excuses for herself. "Look, I have to keep my head down here. Like I already told you, Sanderson got killed because of this illegal mission he set me on, and I really don't want the same thing to happen to me. But you guys were after Max anyway, right? Because if you aren't after him, the evidence all points to you guys working with him." She felt a rush of satisfaction as Clay became visibly angry at the suggestion that he was working with Max.

"Okay, let's hear it then," he said through gritted teeth.

She tried to keep her satisfied smile to herself, but it wasn't easy. "Okay, so Max has been liquidating his assets left, right, and centre. It's enough to make me think he's getting ready to cut and run, and we need to catch up to him before he disappears. Anyway, he just converted one hundred million dollars into bearer bonds. Once the bank notifies him that his bearer bonds are ready, his personal courier will be coming to collect them."

"So what? You want us to steal the money? Lean on the courier?"

Alyson rolled her eyes at his interpretation of her information. "No. The C.C.I. doesn't just _hand over_ a hundred billion dollars to any random guy off the street. In order to verify his identity, the courier will have to provide the top level password for Max's C.C.I. account. With that password, we can hack into Max's accounts. You want to find the man with the plan? We follow the money."

If he had been any less stoic, Alyson was pretty sure that Clay would have actually cracked a smile as he shook her hand in agreement.

"I guess you should meet the team, then," he said, and without another word he headed toward the south bank of the River Thames. Alyson could only assume that she was supposed to follow him. They descended from the bridge to street level, and walked toward the Bankside Gallery that Cougar had been watching them from. Alyson immediately recognized Jensen, now without his baseball cap, standing in front of the Gallery with Aisha and two other men.

As Alyson and Clay approached the others, Jensen grinned and gave her a small, two-fingered wave. "This is my team," Clay said, sweeping his arm out to include everyone. "The Losers. You've met Jensen already," he said as the hacker nodded at Alyson, "and Aisha." Alyson and Aisha eyed each other for a moment, neither of them fully acknowledging the other. "This is Cougar and Pooch," Clay finished, pointing to the sniper in his cowboy hat and the black man with the shaved head, respectively.

Alyson noted the absence of the one named William Roque, but said nothing. Until she was sure of her value to the group, she would not divulge more than she had to or ask any prying questions. She was not stupid; wearing out her welcome too quickly could result in expulsion, or, more likely, a quick death.

"Work with Jensen," Clay said shortly, barely giving her a glance. "He'll keep me updated; figure out what you'll need to get into Max's system."

* * *

**Antigua, West Indies**

**March 2005**

Alyson didn't smile, remembering those first meetings. Those were unhappy, unsure times. The Losers hadn't really trusted her, and despite her claim she didn't really trust them either. Jensen was the only one who had been open and friendly with her, and she said so now.

"Yeah, but I was only so nice at first 'cause I thought you were hot," he said with a small smile that quickly faded when she looked at him. She wondered if he was remembering the same things that she was; their closeness in working together, the inside jokes, the harmless flirting that had quickly escalated... She wondered if he was regretting those memories, if he was sad at the loss.

She couldn't bring herself to ask him, or to talk about the good times. Right now, the memories of good times were only a painful reminder of what she had lost, of what she had thrown away.

* * *

**London, England**

**November 2003**

"This is as much detail as they could give us," Alyson said, flinging down a small folder of papers. "But, if we can figure out what we need to do, I can make sure that it's implemented properly."

Jensen flicked through the file. "It's enough. Besides, it's not going to be whether or not we get the voice imprint, it's going to be how fast I can get in and out of Max's system before he A, shuts me down, and B, finds out where I am."

"What do you need for that?" Alyson asked, taking a seat next to him.

"Actually," he said with a grin, "I have just the place in mind." He turned his computer toward her, showing what looked like an old oil rig.

She raised an eyebrow sceptically. "What the hell is that thing?"

"That," Jensen said grandly, "is the Kingdom of Seadonia, currently ruled by some guy named Dave!"

Alyson found herself laughing at the absurdity of the statement. "The Kingdom of Seadonia? What the hell are you talking about?"

"Once upon a time, this guy Dave says fuck the monarchy and fuck England! He goes out about six miles off the coast, where this old artillery platform is. He sticks a flag in it and says, 'this is my Kingdom of Seadonia, it's in international waters, and everybody else can fuck off!' The government leaves him alone because they basically figure it's one less crazy person stuck in with all of them. Then, Dave developed himself a pretty sweet set-up, which brings us to why he's important to our mission. In order to make money, some outsiders helped Dave to set up his own internet node. He hosts gambling sites and shit like that. He makes some pretty good money off it, but he's nowhere near using full potential. It'll be fast and nearly untraceable."

"Okay, so we use this guy's internet to hack Max, sounds pretty easy."

"It is, for the most part," Jensen said. "The only problem is, I have to physically be there, hooked into Dave's system, for this to work. And I don't think that if I just show up there sayin' pretty please that he'll let me hack into a bank."

Alyson pursed her lips. "You never know 'til you try!"

Jensen laughed. "Well to be honest once I let Clay know that will probably be pretty much the end of that plan. He'll probably send me in with Cougar, hold the guy up at gunpoint until we can get what we need to. Dave is pretty much alone out there except for a couple other guys, and then I can take a bit more time to try and find some information that's worth it."

There was a moment of silence before Alyson opened her mouth, and then quickly shut it again.

"What?" Jensen asked, not missing anything.

"Nothing..." she said slowly. Then, she decided to break her promise to herself that she wouldn't ask too many questions. "Actually, I want to ask you about this whole thing. You guys were under the radar for five years, and I'm assuming that life was pretty peaceful. Why the sudden need for vengeance, or whatever this is?"

"Clay came back," Jensen said with a shrug. "We'd all made our way back State-side within a few months of being declared K.I.A. Clay had stayed there. We kept low profiles, didn't contact each other, didn't do much of anythin'. Then one day Clay gets in touch, tells us he has someone with information on Max, and askin' if we want in. We all said yes; at the time it seemed a hell of a lot better than sittin' on our asses doing nothin'."

"And now...?" Alyson asked, hoping she wasn't going too far.

Jensen shrugged. "Clay's obsessed. He defined his life with his military career. Without it, he was lost. Now he has a mission and a purpose again. I don't think he'll stop until Max is dead or he is."

"What about you?"

"What about me? I'm a military hacker. I follow orders. Clay is our Colonel, and whether I like his plans or not I signed up again."

"But you had a life! You were out of the military and other than being legally dead you had no problems."

Jensen grinned. "Being dead doesn't constitute much of a life, trust me. I had to live at my sister's place, scared of doing anything that would make my name come up anywhere. That being said, in that situation being a hacker does have its' benefits. But the other guys weren't so lucky. I came back for them, I guess. If we can go back to having some semblance of normal life then I'll consider this mission a raging success."

"What if Clay gets you all killed?"

Jensen tried to smile at her, but she could see something else behind it; sadness, perhaps? "Then we die in action, like we were supposed to five years ago."

The conversation was getting too depressing, so Alyson changed the subject to her other concern. "So where does this Aisha chick fit in to all of this?"

He shrugged. "Honestly, I don't really know. Clay found her in Pakistan or somewhere. She gave us information about- well, information that pertained to Max. She set us on the trail we're on now."

"Do you trust her?"

"Not as far as I can throw her," he said shortly. "You, on the other hand," he said, changing the subject quickly, "You seem pretty cool. You know, for a C.I.A. girl." He winked.

"Clay seems to think I'm about thirty seconds away from selling you guys out."

"Well, to be fair, Max is C.I.A. and therefore Clay doesn't exactly have the best impression."

Alyson nodded. "I can understand that, but I hope that he realizes that I really do want to help. Can- can I ask you one more question?"

"That was one," Jensen joked.

"What happened on Operation Draw Venom?"

Jensen became suddenly serious. "It's hard to talk about. How about we talk about something a little more cheerful, and I promise to get back to ya on that one?"

Alyson nodded, feeling like she should somehow reach out and make contact, but then decided against it. "Tell me about your family," she said.

"You really think that's gonna be a better story?"


End file.
